


death can wait until we've lived, right?

by MochiGang



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Dystopia, Alternate Universe - Zombie Apocalypse, Angst, Boys In Love, But I Can't Guarantee A Happy Ending, First time tagging, M/M, Mild Language, Minor Character Death, Sad and Happy, Some Humor, Violence, Zombies Don't Give Two Damns Though
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-05-27
Updated: 2018-05-28
Packaged: 2019-05-14 13:24:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,657
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14770442
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MochiGang/pseuds/MochiGang
Summary: Donghyuck struggles with choosing between going melee or using a gun, similar to how he's struggling between Mark and Yukhei. Renjun is in the same position. But unlike Donghyuck, he has no time for either Jeno or Jaemin, not when death is gnashing at their heels. And Sicheng-he's feeling a little guilty for celebrating his freedom.OrYouth was supposed to be the time for heartache, getting wasted at a house party, and school drama. The undead say otherwise.





	1. Down Came The Rain

Chenle was not one to be quiet.

           On his first day of school, he had managed to drive his teacher into hysterics, after singing his rendition of _Itsy Bitsy Spider_ for the fifty-seventh time in a range that threatened to break glasses, including the one that his teacher was drinking a suspiciously familiar red drink from.

 Of course his mother had assured him that it hadn’t been his fault, and that Miss Wu had just filed for a divorce that summer and had been on the edge since then, so _‘You shouldn’t feel guilty about her quitting, darling. You were just being sweet and tried to cheer her up. Such a shame that she was too far gone.’._

           A teary nod. A warm smile. And a kiss on the head.

That’s what Chenle knew growing up. Warmth and loudness.

           So when he stirred awake in his room’s cold and eerie darkness, he felt as if he had been submerged in a foreign world.

The boy was quick to kick off his sheets, fumbling in the dark to find his iPhone charging atop the nightstand.

_121 unread messages. 26 missed calls. 25 voicemails._

Chenle’s eyes widened, quickly unlocking his phone with trepidation. He had left his phone on mute before crashing on his bed, something that his parents would surely berate him for when he manages to get ahold of them.

 But the phone kept dialing. His father not picking up, despite him being the last missed call. His mother, who had never missed a call, hadn’t picked up either.

           A sudden boom rattled the room and Chenle whipped to face the large sliding doors that led to the balcony.

 He wasn’t prepared to see a large plume of smoke rising into the night sky after opening the blinds, the smoke engulfing a section of the Shanghai city skyline in a slow and lethargic dance.

           “Chenle!” A muffled voice stirred Chenle out of his stupor.

           He didn’t even have to open the door before a young man burst into the room with ferocity. Kun’s familiar face, albeit paler than usual, greeted Chenle. The younger couldn’t even tease his cousin for his disheveled appearance, as he could see that his cousin had been shaken up by something.

 “What’s wrong, _gege_?” Chenle flinched at how small his voice sounded, even in the silent room.

           “Chenle, we ne-need to go. Every-everyone left and—”

If Chenle hadn’t been alarmed then, he was now. Kun had never been anything but the calm, dutiful, and respectable son of Chenle’s uncle.

           Something was terribly _wrong_.

 But Chenle wouldn’t get to see the cause of the terror that wrought Kun’s face, as he was whisked off by the older man who had persisted with composing himself for the sake of his younger cousin, despite having driven past so many desperate souls trying to escape the overrun city.

           Chenle could only glimpse the aftermath of the terror, sitting securely in a private plane amidst familiar faces, looking down at the glowing city.

 The familiar city that he had known, glowing with fire..

           The worst part of the sight had been the specks of dots he could only assume were people, clamoring over each other in their desperation. Chenle _swore_ that he had even some leap from the windows of buildings. And he _swore_ that some of them had kept moving even after making impact.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I just want to shelter Chenle in this apocalypse...put him in a billion dollar cruise where he can relax while the world goes into chaos around him. But sadly, he's not :C. Next chapter is Hyuck's and it's a little (emphasize little) more lighthearted! This is my first NCT writing btw, not to mention my first Ao3 post, so I hope you've been entertained with this brief chapter!  
> Til next time,  
> Bean


	2. Drunk or Dying?

“Stay down!”

 “I swear motherfucker if you don’t stay down I’m going to shoot!”

“Damn it! Stay down!

 

**Ξ**

 

           “Stop wiggling kid! Stay down and tell us where your father is!”

 Donghyuck flinched at the man’s nasty breath bearing down on his face like a train full of rotting carcasses.

He felt a sharp kick at his side that made him clench the dead grass, crunching against his tight grasp.

            _Whoops_.

Apparently he had said the insult out loud, if going by the slurs the nasty geezer kept throwing at him.

           “Considering that I haven’t seen the old man since last Sunday, I can’t exactly tell you where he is.”

 Donghyuck guesses that he could’ve answered the already enraged man less smarmily. Maybe he could’ve saved himself from the black eye he would surely sport the entire week.

            _Damn. Recitals are this week too._

“Tell you what. Let me go now so that I can go to school, and when I return home and see the old man, I’ll tell you immediately. Sound good?” Donghyuck wondered if the man caught all of what he said, since some words came out a bit slurred due to half his face being pressed against the ground.

 When he felt the pressure bearing down on his body disappear, Donghyuck assumes that the man and him had come to a compromise.

           He got up, wheezing and internally cursing at the possibility of having a broken rib from the geezer’s kick, and grabbed his bag from the floor.

 Donghyuck sent the grumbling man a salute before limping his way to where the bus would pick him up.

            _Fuck_.

           Lee Minhyung, or Mark Lee as many of their peers called him, was the co-captain of the soccer team and also the literal reason why Donghyuck even went to his gym classes despite his ‘allergies’ to physical activity. Mark Lee who was also standing and waiting for the _same bus_ that Donghyuck rode _everyday_ , vibing to whatever music that played from his headphones, as if his presence hadn’t just stolen Donghyuck’s already labored breath away.

 In contrast to Mark’s overall President Aura, Donghyuck was pretty sure he emanated the aura of A-Boy-In-Love-And-Also-In-Pain-Because-Of-His-Gambling-Father’s-Debts, which his split lip and dirt stained uniformed so pitifully upheld. Not to mention that he was sporting the obvious beginnings of a black eye.

           He couldn’t face the love of his life like this.

So he did what any reasonable hormone filled teenage boy would do, and turned back around to where he came from, planning to skip school in a convenience store, eating ramen, and moping about his lack of a love life.

 The plan would’ve gone splendidly if he wasn’t immediately faced by the chest of a tall boy, or more specifically, a stretched out loud annoyance.

           “Yukhei.” Donghyuck hissed out.

The older boy’s eyes immediately flickered down to the cut on Donghyuck’s lips, his own lips parting in concern. Or what Donghyuck deemed to be his _stupid_ face.

 “What happened to you?”

           “None of your concern. Now move your ass out of—”

 “You’re not going to school?”

Donghyuck shut his eyes in annoyance and huffed out a defeated sigh. When he opened his eyes, Yukhei’s own large and weirdly concerned ones bore down upon him, with the sight of a yellow blur nearing them in the background.

           “Guess I am.” Donghyuck sighed.

He made sure to board the bus first, claiming the furthest seat in the back, so that he wouldn’t have to walk past Mark and embarrass himself.

           Yukhei sat next to Mark and greeted him in his boisterous manner, too loud for even Donghyuck who slumped down in his seat.

 To make matters worse, Donghyuck saw a stumbling figure in the middle of the street and hoped that it wasn’t his deadbeat father coming back from whatever abyss he had drank himself into.

           The burnt-orange haired boy’s eyes focused on the stumbling figure, jolting at the bus driver’s choice to honk, and noted that it hadn’t been his father, but had still been someone he knew: his neighbor’s jobless son who had ‘ran off’ days ago.

 Donghyuck, ever curious, peered closer as the man passed the side of the bus and his eyes widened at seeing what looked like blood, pouring from some open wound near the man’s neck.

 The bus drove off before he could see the wound in detail.

And his neighbor…his neighbor would succumb from the wounds and die in his own home, and his mother would return and find her son rushing towards her in a frenzied, animalistic hug.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The hug was metaphorical. He bit her. Oh and this chapter is set in South Korea just to clarify. But what do you guys think of the characters introduced so far? Any predictions in how the hell are these boys gonna live when they can't even function under normal problems???  
> Poor Hyuck already starting off with injuries :(  
> Til next chapter,  
> Bean


	3. Crimson Red

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Before we start I wanted to say that this chapter takes place chronologically after Chapter Two, duh. But Chapter One with Chenle actually happens after Chapter One because I set that chapter at night in Shanghai which is an hour behind from Seoul and it would be weird for Shanghai to go through a cataclysmic event without the whole world hearing about it in the news. So basically, Chapter One takes place somewhere around Chapter Three's time. Just to clear any confusion :)

There seemed to be many students missing, Renjun noted.

           He had noticed it first when he was boarding the bus, finding his morning commute to be less stressful without the presence of the group of boys who had dedicated themselves to harassing the boy everyday, on their way to school. For once, Renjun had actually gotten the chance to sketch in the bus without having his pencil snatched out of his hands and snapped. Of course, after the first few times they had done it, he had never used his _expensive_ charcoal pencils.

           Maybe he had gotten used to their bullying, but Renjun had felt something more than relief. There, in the back of his thoughts, laid a worried voice. It was the same voice that sounded off whenever he’d mixed too much of the Titanium White. The voice had been trying to tell him something. But it was as if Renjun could only hear the tone of the voice and not its words.

 “Injunnie!”

Renjun jolted in his seat, his absent minded sketch bearing a harsh line from where his hand slipped out of shock.

           “Oops, did I scare you?”

           Renjun didn’t even have to strain to hear Jaemin’s sarcasm, already dripping this early in the morning. The aforementioned boy didn’t even bother to wipe the amusement off of his handsome— _ughh really Renjun? Handsome? This early?_

           It was as if Jaemin had heard his best friend’s inner dilemma, scrunching his nose and ruffling the smaller boy’s dark hair, much to Renjun’s own dismay.

 It had been a thing between the two childhood friends ever since Jaemin, the younger of the two, had grown taller than the other. It didn’t matter if Renjun had grown a bit during his early middle school years, Jaemin would always catch up and surpass him. And so, the one sided hair ruffling with Jaemin as the Giver and Renjun as the blushing _and_ grumbling Receiver.

           Jaemin unabashedly dragged an empty desk, which wasn’t even his since he wasn’t even in Renjun’s class, closer towards Renjun.

 “Hey, where’s everyone in your class?” Jaemin flippantly asked.

Renjun stilled in his attempt to erase the harsh line cutting through the cherry blossom tree, and looked up into the other boy’s Burnt Sienna eyes.

           “You noticed it too?”

 “Why are you whispering?”

 Before Renjun could respond, some of his classmates entered the classroom in a mixture of both grogginess and peppiness. Still, the class had seemed significantly emptier, even with the additional bodies.

           “Duckie!”

 A resounding groan erupted from those unused to Jaemin’s loud yet deep voice, which Renjun found odd as the boy had always been a fixture in classroom 3C before classes started.

 “Damn. Are those dudes bothering you again?” Jaemin asked Donghyuck who had approached the two with a slight limp to his usually comical stride.

           Now, Renjun was a rather perceptive boy. Maybe it was because of his love for art and all its intricacies that made him aware of most things that others would’ve missed, but Renjun didn’t need his Sherlock eyes to have glanced that his other best friend had had a rough start to his day.

 “And I’m assuming that you’re not even going to the nurse?” Renjun intoned to which Donghyuck rolled his eyes in response.

           “Of course not. Last time I did, Nurse Lee called my father and all I got was him getting angry about not minding my own business. As if I wanted to get ganged up on.” Donghyuck scoffed.

 Renjun sighed. His best friend had the glaring habit of covering his problems with sarcasm and biting remarks. Renjun was used to it and so was Jaemin, however neither liked their friend’s habit, especially when the problems were so evident on their friend’s body.

           “Do you guys want to come over to my house after school?” Jaemin offered casually, even if Renjun knew that it was just his way of ensuring that Donghyuck wouldn’t have to go to his house and all its problems.

 “I wish, but I think that you forgot that we have cram school.”

“Oh Injunnie, I didn’t forget. I just chose to ignore it.” Donghyuck shared a high five with Jaemin, the two wearing matching grins that could scare off any rookie teacher.

           Renjun shook his head, wondering how he even bothered with the two for so long. He chalked it up to the fact that without his responsible self, the two wouldn’t even bother showing up to school until the latter half of the day. Maybe that’s what the majority of his class, of perhaps the majority of the student body, had planned, explaining why the school seemed so empty.

 The halls sparse and practically void of life.

 

**Ξ**

 

 “CRAM SCHOOL IS DONE! WE’RE FREE!”

           Renjun winced from where he sat, diligently finishing his English work with as much pride he could muster. He wasn’t even in the same classroom as Yukhei but he had heard the older Chinese transfer student all the way from his class. Donghyuck heard it as well and groaned whilst stretching, letting out a few choice sounds that earned a few side eyes from Renjun.

 The two boys packed up without haste, each dreading the end of cram school for different reasons.

They slowly made their way over to Professor Seo, who merely brought out Mr. Phone Bucket without even sparing them a glance, Renjun and Donghyuck being the last ones to collect their phones.

           They both turned on their devices and simultaneously an influx of rings sounded in the quiet classroom. It would’ve been the usual. Professor Seo wouldn’t even bother lifting his head from the English exams he would have been marking up. Except this time it was different.

 Their phones cried out, having been shut for the entire cram school, causing Professor Seo to lift his head in annoyance.

           Renjun stared down at his own phone and clutched it tighter in response to the amount of missed calls from his father. He unlocked his phone, not paying mind to Donghyuck who had done the same thing, and read the most recent message.

  _GO HOME TO YOUR AUNT AND LOCK THE DOORS._

“What’s going on?”

Renjun lifted his worried eyes from the message and locked eyes with his best friend’s glistening ones.

           “My mom…she told me to stay away from the neighborhood. Said that there’s police everywhere and that there was a shootout outside my house.” Donghyuck whispered and the room suddenly felt all to cold for the remaining occupants.

  _One. Two. Thr_ —

Professor Seo interrupted the chilling silence with his long limbs nearly knocking the stack of papers on his desk, in his haste to get to his own phone which he had set aside. Donghyuck could only watch helplessly as the man frantically spoke to whoever was on the other end of the line. Renjun lifted his own phone, despite it feeling like lead in his shaking hand, and opened the news app.

            _Breaking News: Shanghai on Fire_

  _Three. Four. Five._

“I have students in my care right now! What am I supposed to do?”

_Si—Six. S—Sev—_

           Renjun stumbled past Donghyuck and out into the hallway, tripping on his own feet before catching himself and dry heaving.

 He didn’t register the other stray students who were coping with the news that the world was ending in their own ways. He didn’t register much of anything past the nausea that wracked his body, until a pair of strong hands lifted him up onto his two feet, commanding Renjun’s attention. His blurred vision focused on a dark haired man’s face, a face both foreign and familiar to the slight boy. The man also wore the standard uniform for the police in the precinct. And although Renjun had suffered a mild panic attack, his trained eyes spotted the red stains all over the man’s uniform.

           The boy could tell the difference between red paint and blood _—and oh God, it’s blood_.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow okay it's starting to pick up. If the pacing is a bit weird, I'm sorry. I got impatient and I wanted to get to the meat (like the zombies). Thank you for all the kudos, comments, and bookmarks! I'll write more and hopefully longer chapters. Now who do you think was the cop at the end? I was going to describe him by something else but that would be too obvious and it didn't fit the mood.  
> Til next time,  
> Bean


End file.
